Microsoft is whipping up interest in its latest cloud-based enterprise application offering – Dynamics 365 — ahead of its launch, expected to be at the Dynamic Communities’ Summit 2016, to be held in Tampa October 11 to 14.

(Dynamic Communities is the administrative organisation behind a number of professional associations and Dynamics user groups).

Dynamics 365, to be integrated with Office 365, will combine three Azure-hosted Microsoft services: the cloud version of Microsoft's Dynamics AX ERP suite, Dynamics CRM Online, and the Project Madeira small-business financials offering.

Microsoft’s Dynamics 365 website says: “Join us to be among the first to see Microsoft Dynamics 365 in action with a keynote from Microsoft EVP Scott Guthrie” and there’s a teaser on the site from no lesser a figure than Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, in a LinkedIn post but reproduced as a Microsoft blog. He portrays the functionality of Dynamics 365 as representing the realisation of a long-held personal, company and, indeed, industry goal.

“[In early July] we took a major step forward with the introduction of Microsoft Dynamics 365, to empower business users with built-in insights and intelligence within the business applications they’re working on – apps like field service, sales, finance, operations,” Nadella says.

Fulfilling Satya Nadella’s dream

“This has been a dream of the industry, but also for me personally since 2000 when Microsoft acquired Great Plains. When I led that group, we dreamt of doing things for our customers and partners that are now only possible because of widespread adoption of the cloud, proliferation of data, devices and sensors, and agile development environments.”

He continues: “Realising this dream requires unlocking data stored in silos and monolithic suites of applications so customers can combine them to derive new insights, extend and modify their business processes quickly, and surface them in the communications and collaboration tools millions of people use at work every day. Therefore, it requires us to reinvent business processes taking both a people-centric and platform-centric approach.”

Analyst firm Nucleus Research has, according to reports, been made privy to details of the forthcoming Dynamic 365 and had this to say on its website: “Dynamics 365 [is] a new approach to business applications that brings together Dynamics CRM, AX [ERP], and Office 365 with a unified application platform and data model. Building on the capabilities of Power BI and PowerApps, this new approach further democratises the development of business applications and gives Microsoft a powerful competitive weapon against standalone ERP and CRM players.”

“A powerful competitive weapon”

The firm’s further insights are available only to its paying customers, but its VP of research, Rebecca Wettemann, has been quoted saying: “This announcement definitely gives Microsoft the opportunity to show the value of CRM and ERP working together, which Salesforce doesn’t have. … CRM and ERP applications have traditionally been bought separately, or at least by different buyers, and few other players offer a common data model for CRM and ERP – and none bring in the Office productivity capabilities as Microsoft can.”

She was reported saying Dynamics 365 would be “a powerful competitive weapon against standalone ERP and CRMplayers” and is “likely to accelerate Microsoft’s consistent growth” in CRM market share.

About Lanrex

Our team are highly experienced in helping businesses get the most out of technology. Consulting, cloud infrastructure and outsourced IT services.

Don't waste your budget spend on soon-to-be-obsolete technology that can't evolve with your business. Find out now if your business is cloud ready? In only a few moments find out with our Cloud Ready self-assessment tool